Fixing the Holes
by samaryley
Summary: Some holes were just never meant to be filled in. Ponyboy is forced to revisit some events of his past.


**I don't own the Outsiders. All characters belong to S.E. Hinton.**

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It was hot, one of the hottest days of summer. The kind of day where you take a shower to cool off, and the minute you step out, the heat's right there to greet you, humidity attacking you as though somebody'd thrown a warm, wet barbershop towel over your whole body. The kind of day you can sweat just from the mere effort of breathing. I hated it, and I sat draped over the armchair, not wanting any part of my body touching any other. Soda lay similarly on the couch, a pedestal fan whirring between us, hardly making a dent in the stifling air. It was the kind of day where nothing moved – the universe practically willed you to be still – nothing, that is, except that which, by nature, simply couldn't be stilled. Namely, my brother: Darrel Curtis.

I don't know if it was the fact that he spent so much time up on roofs under the blazing hot Tulsa sun, the asphalt reflecting the heat back up at him like a hotcake on a griddle, or maybe that his brain cells had been fried so much by that heat that he no longer had the good sense to stay still – but it was as though he didn't register temperature any more. He was as active, as _driven_ - as frustratingly _productive_ - as ever. He crashed through the screen door, some sort of home repair equipment in hand, as usual.

"Dar, sit down, _relax_. It's your day off, for Christ's sake, not to mention the fact that it's about a thousand goddamned degrees in here." Soda's limbs hung like a dead man's over the side of the couch, his voice emanating from a form sunken deeply into the cushions.

"Get up, Soda. I need to move the couch."

"What the hell? You're rearranging _furniture?_ In this heat?" As predictable as Darry's non-stop productivity was, it still surprised even me sometimes.

"No, Pony, I'm not _rearranging furniture_. I'm finally getting around to fixing the holes."

"_What?_"

"I've had this on my to-do list forever, because every time the state workers come in, I see them looking at all the holes and cracks you and your knucklehead friends have put in the walls. Hell, this place looks bad enough without the walls _actually_ falling down. The joint compound should set with no problem in this heat."

"Well, that makes you a knucklehead too, then, 'cause you've put as many dents in these walls as any of the rest of us." It was Soda who said it, though I knew it to be true.

"Knucklehead or not, get up. _Both of you_. I need to get all the furniture away from the walls."

Neither of us moved.

"_Now_," Darry boomed, and, as unenthusiastically as humanly possible, we dragged our chair and couch away from the wall, both of us immediately assuming our previous positions, cursing the fact that that one mere minute of physical activity had caused us to break out in a sweat.

Darry opened the container of joint compound and dipped in, with the trowel. He lifted it up, to fill in a hole behind the couch, and I wanted to rush him, to stop him from touching the wall there – from filling these holes.

But I didn't. I just watched, as he applied the putty to the wall, sealing the hole, forever. I watched, closing my eyes, and I remembered. Every hole had a story to tell, and I knew them all.

_Hole #1: It was last year, fall semester, just before Christmas_. I was sitting on the couch, doing geometry homework. Stupid geometry – I always hated it. Not so much thinking as just plain measuring. Protractors, rulers, compasses – I hated them all. I had just measured two sides of a triangle to finish up with a proof, when suddenly Two-Bit and Dallas charged through the door, Dallas hot on Two-Bit's tail for God-only-knows what he'd said, but he'd been drunk, and Dallas hadn't liked whatever had come out of his mouth.

"Protect me, Pony," he joked as he slammed into me, catching me off guard, ruler in hand. Before I knew it the ruler was halfway through the wall, all of us frozen, and Two-Bit suddenly sober.

Mom was suddenly in the doorway, and both Dallas and Two-Bit were immediately repentant.

"Uh, sorry Mrs. Curtis," Dallas managed.

"Yeah, uh… we'll patch that up, or pay for it or, whatever," Two-Bit stuttered.

"Ponyboy," Mom said, "Why don't you go finish that homework in your room?" she said, though she wasn't really asking. "Keith and Dallas, would you boys like some dinner? We've got plenty left over…"

……………………………

Darry headed to the other side of the couch, and started on another hole, this one smaller than the last. I was surprised to see him patching this one without flinching.

Hole #2: _Darry was fourteen, and had just finished helping Dad with replacing some floorboards on the front porch._ He came in to find Johnny and I sitting on the couch, giggling at the television. He turned to face us, giving us a mock lecture.

"You know, that stuff is just destroying your brain cells," he said, gesturing towards the television but losing his grip on the screwdriver in his hand, unintentionally sending it sailing through the air, landing in the wall a mere inch from Johnny's face. Two inches to the left and it would have hit him right in the eye. None of us reacted right away, all of us frozen, shocked.

"Shit, Johnny, I'm sorry," Darry finally managed.

"That's okay," he responded, his dark eyes brave, not showing an ounce of fear about the fact that he could have just been hit in the eye and blinded by an errant screwdriver.

I never saw Johnny sit in that spot again.

…………………………….

There was another hole, just where the upper right corner of the couch met the wall.

_Hole #3: My ten-year-old frame sat in the corner, terrified_. I'd never seen this before. Mom and Dad were out, and Darry and Two-Bit were fighting, really fighting. Punching, kicking; drawing blood, even.

"You don't put your hands on her, _ever_," Darry growled. Soda and Steve stood off to the side, apparently willing to let things between the two of them work themselves out.

"I didn't know, Darry! Hell, you wanna date girls in secret, how'm I supposed to know they're yours? Jesus, I never did it on purpose."

Darry grabbed him off the floor, swinging him around and smashing him into the couch, slamming the upper part of the armrest into the wall, making a dent in the plaster.

"Next time, you make sure she ain't taken before you so much as lay a hand on her."

Later that night, Darry sat on my bed, trying to explain.

"Kiddo… I'm sorry you had to see that, but, no matter what, even with your buddies, you always stick up for your girl…"

I never saw Darry and Two-Bit fight again.

………………………….

Darry reached up and started to patch another mark on the wall, just above where the phone had always been. Even he didn't know about the origins of this hole.

_Hole #4: Mom and Dad were upset, and Soda and I both knew it_, though they didn't know we did. They thought we were in bed, but as soon as we'd heard their frantic talk, we'd both been awake. We stood cowering in the hallway, just out of eyeshot.

"What did they say?" Mom asked, panic evident in her voice.

"They haven't had any reports about anybody matching his description." Dad didn't sound calm, either.

"It's not like him," Mom said, and she seemed on the verge of tears. "He would never not call if he was going to be late. You have to find him."

"I'm trying," Dad said, suddenly sounding angry. "Damn it, Molly, don't you think if I had any idea where he was I'd be on my way there, to get him?" He slammed the phone against the wall, making a small hole. Mom cried out, and we saw him go to her.

"I'm sorry, Molly," he said. "I'm just worried, same as you."

Ten minutes later, Darry called, and Dad went out to get him, stuck at a party with no sober ride home.

It was the only time I'd ever seen my Dad strike out in anger.

………………………………

Darry moved on to seal the next hole – a large one in the corner opposite the front door.

_Hole #5: It was father's day, 1962_, and we had bought Dad a new armchair. He came in to the room, his eyes closed, and as soon as he opened them. Soda lost all self-control, jumping on the chair and unintentionally extending the footrest, sending the back of the chair directly into the wall, creating a hole in the plaster. Nobody could find it in themselves to be mad, however, looking at Soda's crazy grin.

Dad sat in that chair every night until the night he died.

………………………………

There was a big hole, just beside the front door. It took a bunch of tape as well as a whole lot of passes of the trowel to fill it.

_Hole #6: It was two Christmases ago_. Dad had surprised us all with a mini-pool table. He had planned for us to set it up in the basement, but due to the usual Christmas enthusiasm, it got set up right there in the living room.

"Eight ball, corner pocket," Two-Bit said, cocky as ever. He winked, drew back his cue… and sent it directly through the wall.

Even Dad had to laugh at that.

* * *

Darry moved around the room to one last hole, right at the baseboard by the kitchen door. I knew we all remembered it, though we'd never spoken of it.

_Hole #7: It was April._ We were all little, so little that I could hardly remember. I was four, Soda was seven, and Darry seemed old, to me, at eleven. Dad had brought the crib back in from where it had been stored in the garage for the past two years since I outgrew it. It looked familiar to me, and, while I wanted it to be mine again, there was talk of a new sister or brother, and I had been prepared for the fact that it wouldn't be mine. Dad struggled to manage with it, turning the corner, and one of the metal joints hit the plaster, just where the doorframe met the molding. He cursed.

"Darrel," Mom blushed. "It's fine. Don't worry about it." She looked happy, her belly round, her face more filled out than in most of my memories.

"Sorry, babe," Dad said, and headed down to their bedroom to set it up.

A week later, the crib suddenly disappeared from their bedroom. Mom spent a week in bed, "sick," according to our Dad. The removal of the crib was never mentioned again, by any of us.

But we all, even me, knew what we'd lost.

………………………………….

It felt similar, my sense of loss, as Darry wiped off the trowel and closed up the container of joint compound. Cosmetically, all the holes may well have been filled, but, in my mind, they never, ever would be.

Some holes, it seemed, just were meant to be left uncovered..

**A/N: This was inspired by the next chapter in my Scout saga, and references a few things from that fiction. The formatting - brief glimpses into the past - was absolutely borrowed from Feistyfeist's "20" series, and I hope she will excuse me for stealing... even though there are fewer "glimpses here. I'd appreciate any input.**


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